Police: HIV-positive man may have exposed 300 partners

Sep. 5, 2013
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by Melanie Eversley, USA TODAY

by Melanie Eversley, USA TODAY

A local police department in southeast Missouri confirms the arrest of an HIV-positive man who published reports say admitted to having sex with hundreds of men without telling them his health status.

The Dexter Police Department confirmed the arrest of David Lee Mangum, 37, of Dexter, whose case prompted Stoddard County Prosecuting Attorney Russell Oliver to publicly urge anyone who has had sex with the suspect or with an anonymous male they met on the Craigslist classified site to cease sexual activity and get tested immediately for the HIV virus. Police say Mangum may have exposed more than 300 sex partners to HIV.

Magnum is scheduled to be arraigned at 9 a.m. Thursday morning at the Stoddard County (Mo.) Justice Center in Bloomfield, according to records on file with the Missouri Office of the State Courts Administrator. The agency says he was arrested Aug. 28 on a charge of recklessly infecting another with HIV when "knowingly infected," which is a felony. Bond has been set at $250,000.

The case blew up after a man saying he was Mangum's former live-in partner approached the Dexter Police Department to file a complaint against Mangum, who he says infected him with HIV, the Statesman reports from an affidavit filed by Dexter police Det. Cory Mills of the Dexter department.

The man, identified by the Los Angeles Times as D.B., said he met Mangum through an ad on Craigslist, the online classified site, and that Mangum assured him before they had sex that he did not have any sexually transmitted diseases, according to the affidavit. They lived together from November until June when D.B. said he learned Mangum was sleeping with other people and ended the relationship, according to the affidavit.

Magnum told police he was diagnosed with HIV in Texas in 2003 and that he'd had more than 300 sexual partners since then, the Times reported. Fifty to 60 of those partners also lived in Stoddard County, the Times reported.